Clarkston Ward!

Week two in the Clarkston Ward! My updated verdict on the area is actually pretty much the same. Most people here are really quite nice, but just knocking on their door isn't the best way to get people to listen. Too bad that's almost all we have to do all day :) Naw, it's cool. We actually got a referral from a member in Oregon for his friend that he was buddies with since like the 60's. But they both got deployed to Vietnam and lost contact.. until this past week. Friday, to be exact. So they got to talking, and the member invited his friend to read and learn more about the Book of Mormon. He said yes, and we got the referral that day. We stopped by the next day with a Book of Mormon, and this guys was just blown away that we were getting to him so quickly. He was like "You guys are better than next day air with Amazon!" It was pretty funny. He's super nice, and we'll be following up with him sometime. 

We had an investigator come to church! Woo! His name in Brian, and Elder Ryder and his previous comp taught him a couple of times. He was out of town for the first week and a bit that I've been here, but we invited him to church, and he came and really enjoyed it! It's funny,

Oh yeah, something I forgot to mention last week is that Elder Gerald N. Lund was at the Clarkston last Sunday! I had no idea it was him until Bishop told us, so I went and talked to him for a couple of minutes. We didn't know this either, but apparently, Elder Lund is the WML's father in law. Of course, we found this out after Elder Lund left, and not even by our Ward Mission Leader. He's not really the kind of guy to tote that around though. Speaking of my WML, his name is Brother Belliston, and he is just great. He is very involved with the work, and is in contact with us frequently to check up on how things are going, and if there's anything he can do to help. 

So yeah, thanks for reading!

 (Note from Gabbi: This has nothing to do with his post, but I wanted to add a picture, and I just love these. This was at the party following his farewell talk. l-r Gabbi, Elder Roderer, Sister Redd)

 l-r Elder Adamson, Sister Redd, Elder Roderer.

New Address and Pictures

Drop Elder Roderer a note!! :)

 

 

Elder Patrik Roderer

11010 Highland Rd. Apt #12

White Lake, MI 48386

 

 

 This poor guy just built a barn at the wrong spot :/

 Elder Roderer and the mission Jeep in White Lake, MI

 Elder Roderer, Elder Williams, Samantha

Here's a picture of Samantha and her kids :)

 Just taking a stroll down memory lane with my comp :)

Elder Roderer is the new DL

Hey everybody!

This week was pretty eventful. So like I said last week, I got the call that I was being transferred and being a district leader somewhere. Well, like all of Monday, it rained insanely hard, and pretty much flooded part of the mission. Where I was at in Plymouth, we got about 5 inches of rain, so you can imagine how that would flood any parts of last that was a bit lower. So at any rate, in consequence of all that happening, transfer meeting got canceled "until further notice" which turned out to be the next day. 

But anyways, I did get transferred, and I am now in the Clarkston Ward. It's a pretty cool Ward, the people seem to be really nice too. My new companion is Elder Ryder from Glendale, AZ and he's been out for 21 months. He was actually Elder Williams' MTC companion, so that's kind of funny. And we were in the same district while I was in Warren too. He's a pretty cool guy :)

So I am the district leader in my new area. I'll be honest, it's a pretty lame district. It's us and the set of Sisters in the Ward, so not many (Like zero, because as an Elder, you can't really be friends with Sisters) fellow missionaries to bond with. Oh well. At least I don't have to bother with exchanges ;) But what's been nice is that I haven't had to lead a district meeting yet, because it got canceled last week when transfer meeting ended up on that day, and this week is Specialized Training :) 

This area is cool though. The people just as a general population seem to be really nice. Like with tracting, everyone has been pretty polite and stuff! Even when we went to this super rich area, everyone was way nice. 

One interesting thing about the Water here in White Lake. It's like full of rust. So our shower and sink and toilet all look like they're rusty. It also smells pretty strange too. It's okay though, it works :)

Oh, I'm also in a car again after about 10 months! :) Actually, I'm not in a car, I'm in a Jeep Compass. Don't know how this area scored that, but there are for sure no complaints here :)

Anyways, I'll tell you more about the area and stuff next week.

Thanks for reading!

~Elder Roderer

Here's the parking lot of a mega church that is down the street a bit from the Plymouth apartment. it doesn't look that deep from the edge, but if you try to ride like 5 more feet from the curb, your feet are going under water.

 

 

Elder Roderer is getting transferred!

Hey everyone!

This week was good. The Sister missionaries in the Ward had another baptism, so that's super sweet! They are an older couple that was referred my one of the members a while ago.

We found a couple of new investigators, so that was really cool. One of them is a Black girl that is around our age, but we're pretty sure she is "interested" because she's got a thing for either one or both of us soo... The other investigator is the lady that came to

church last week out of the blue. We were able to meet with and teach her last week,

and she was really interested in what we were saying, and was asking some great questions, and was really excited to get a copy of the Book of Mormon. Pamela didn't meet with us this week. She texted us and said that "Meeting with you guys takes time and patience, neither of which I seem to have this week." So we actually did not invite her to the baptism. Thinking about it, we should have anyway. Repentance is real I guess. 

So yeah, I'm getting transferred on Tuesday. I'm kind of sad, but it was bound to happen at

 some point. No idea where I'm going, but President Gerber called me on Sunday and asked (Like I have a choice) me to be the district leader in my new area. I guess it'll be a growing experience. President told me that as a leader, my area should be the best in the district, but that there will be a set of Sisters that will give me a run for my money. Pray for me please!

                                                  (My old district)

We saw the new Mustang GT350 in testing camo, so that was super cool. And we also had dinner with a few Ford employees, so I got to talk cars and ask questions, so that was sweet :) One of the members pretty much decided that the new F-150 would be aluminum. I actually saw and talked to him and the family at the Auto Show while I was in Belle Isle, so that was fun to realize the other day :)

 Anyways, I'll talk to you all next week and let you know where I ended up :)

Thanks for reading!

~Elder Roderer

 Some duckies that we found while we were out exercising in the morning, so we fed them.